The Contingent Nature of Public Policy and the Growth of U.S. Commercial Banking

Abstract

That public policy affects organizational behaviors is well accepted, but less explored is how these effects may depend on other external environmental factors. We investigate how policy is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition to understand the growth of commercial banking in the United States, 1896-1978. We highlight a trade-off for banks between centralized and dispersed growth strategies and show that which strategy prevails depends on how policy enabling branching interacts with technological, economic, and cultural environments. Our findings contribute to understanding the contingent effects of policy on organizations and on the growth of large corporations in the twentieth century.

Under increased pressure to report environmental impacts, some firms selectively disclose relatively benign impacts, creating an impression of transparency while masking their true performance. We identify key company- and country-level factors that limit firms' use of selective disclosure by intensifying scrutiny on them and by diffusing global norms to their headquarters' countries. We test our hypotheses using a novel panel dataset of 4,750 public companies across many industries and headquartered in 45 countries during 2004–2007. Results show that firms that are more environmentally damaging, particularly those in countries where they are more exposed to scrutiny and global norms, are less likely to engage in selective disclosure. We discuss contributions to the literature that spans institutional theory and strategic management and to the literature on information disclosure.